


Hand Size

by RenderedReversed



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: ...or is there :thinkingface:, M/M, comparing hand sizes, no kink just soft, the soft au
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-11
Updated: 2020-02-11
Packaged: 2021-02-27 21:08:16
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,170
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22662238
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RenderedReversed/pseuds/RenderedReversed
Summary: In which Harry is kind of obsessed with Voldemort’s hands.Voldemort is reluctantly indulgent.
Relationships: Harry Potter/Voldemort
Comments: 69
Kudos: 1087
Collections: Harry Potter





	Hand Size

**Author's Note:**

  * Translation into Tiếng Việt available: [Cỡ Tay](https://archiveofourown.org/works/23027476) by [Jellyfish (DandelionAdrian)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/DandelionAdrian/pseuds/Jellyfish)
  * Translation into 中文-普通话 國語 available: [【翻译】Hand Size](https://archiveofourown.org/works/24067552) by [Boreas0606](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Boreas0606/pseuds/Boreas0606)



Back in Hogwarts, Harry never really understood what the obsession was between girls and hands.

They’d giggle and fluster when they talked about a _boy’s_ —“Oh, his _hands_ ,” they’d say, with that weird intonation that used to make him feel all prickly and self-conscious and like he very much did not want to be within earshot of the ensuing conversation—and when they talked about a _girl’s_ , well, it was almost like there was a universal ritual that crossed age, language, and even house rivalry:

One girl would hold up her hand, palm forward and fingers spread. Then she would wait with determined solemnity, until the other girl—the girl she was entreating—pressed their palms together and spread her fingers till their hands lined up like a mirror.

The silence would break. “Your hands are so small!” one would exclaim, and the other would pout and reach out and touch, “No, yours are just _big_ , look at how long your fingers are—" and then the rest, if they were, in fact, in a group, would begin comparing hand sizes in exactly the same way.

He’d seen it with Hufflepuffs. He’d seen it with Ravenclaws. He’d even seen it happen once between a Gryffindor and a Slytherin girl, though they had been hiding in a secluded corner that would’ve intrigued him had they not been, you know, girls.

(He’d been twelve, okay. At the time, he didn’t really know how to interact with girls who weren’t named Hermione.)

And when the Triwizard Tournament had brought the other schools to Hogwarts in his fourth year, he’d seen Beauxbatons girls suspiciously clumped with a crowd of mixed houses, tittering and exclaiming over the exact same thing, only in French. Even the Durmstrang girls with their heavier accents, sharp expressions and broader shoulders had not been exempt.

It was a girl thing. It had _always_ been a girl thing.

But now, staring at Voldemort’s hands, Harry wasn’t so sure if it was _exclusively_ a girl thing.

Voldemort’s hands were exceptionally pale, and his fingers long. Harry did not think they were what girls thought of when they admired the size of a man’s hands or the length of his fingers, the smoothness of his skin or the knob of his knuckles.

But _Harry_ thought of them. The way they curled around the book’s leather spine. The way they dangled, sharp, like talons gone lax off the side of the armrest. The way he really, really wanted to touch them right now, and see the difference for himself all lined up like a mirror’s reflection as they pressed palm-to-palm. His hands were definitely smaller. It was just a matter of how smaller. And Harry wanted to see.

So really, it couldn’t be just a girl thing. And probably not a platonic thing. Or even a heterosexual thing. To be fair, he’d never really bothered giving labels to his sexuality, but probably at like a 99.9% certainty, Harry was not feeling very straight at the moment.

So naturally, because Harry was never the best at restraining his feelings around this man, he sat down on the floor so close he could rest his head against the side of the Dark Lord’s thigh and called imploringly,

“Voldemort.”

For what it was worth, Voldemort spared a glance away from his book and down. Harry held his hand up and stared, eager and waiting.

The Dark Lord stared right back. “…What are you doing.”

Harry sighed. Fine, so maybe the girl thing was signaling to each other implicitly without explanation. He could believe that. After all, Angelina and Katie did it loads of times on the Quidditch Pitch, right before they pulled off a new, wacky maneuver that had Wood simultaneously pulling his hair out and cheering.

“Comparing hand size,” he explained patiently. “C’mon.”

Voldemort seemed to be considering whether he should hex him or ignore him. Harry, not to be outdone—or ignored—tilted his head, pressing his cheek to Voldemort's leg as he made his eyes just big enough and his mouth just pretty enough to cajole a lesser man to death.

(In an ironic twist of fate, he’d actually learned the basis of the technique from Riddle. Ha, serves him right.)

“You can’t get everything you want in life just by batting your eyelashes,” Voldemort said, unimpressed.

The look dropped. Something more Harry—more shit-eating, more like—replaced it. “Well, I got _you_ , didn’t I?”

The muscle under his cheek stiffened. Voldemort looked annoyed at himself for being so affected.

Harry raised his hand again. “C’mon, it’ll be fun.”

“ _Fun_ ,” Voldemort muttered under his breath. Still, with a soft sigh of his own, he raised the hand not keeping his book aloft and gently pressed it to Harry’s.

Harry took in an unconscious breath. It was—big. The difference was large. Voldemort’s hand dwarfed Harry’s by a full third. Surely his fingers would slot so easily into the space between—Harry knew they would, and how it felt by the experience of over a dozen times, but oh he’d never really looked at them like this before. The clear differentiation made his heart quicken and his throat swallow nothing. It made him feel—small. But not in the bad way. _Definitely_ not in the bad way.

Voldemort’s hands could eclipse his own any time they chose to. They were dangerous, these hands—they’d tortured and commanded torture. Took lives. Would take them again for lesser insults to his person—to Harry’s person.

For all they were capable of and for all they had done, these hands had not hurt Harry for a long, long time. Ever since their owner had sworn not to, in fact. Fingers long, thin, deadly like bone, lax in Harry’s hands. Nails capable of gouging eyeballs, throats and veins, didn’t even draw blood when Harry pressed a finger to them. The calluses on his palm worn from the bite of his wand handle, rough but yielding to Harry’s inspection, comfortable as he rubbed the bloodlust away like one might stroke a cat’s fur down.

Harry hadn’t realized when he had stopped looking and started _touching_ until after the fact. He stiffened, pulling away until the hand he’d been playing with drew him back. They rose to press his head back against Voldemort’s thigh, then tangled in his hair. Harry, eye-to-eye with the armchair cushions, whined.

There was a huff of laughter, and then the hand presented itself to him again. Harry took it, and instead of continuing with his earlier fondling, only held it, savoring the contact over the touch. Voldemort tolerated it as he tolerated many other things Harry did. The thumb rubbing idle circles against the back of his hand was proof.

After a while, Voldemort asked, “Satisfied?”

He hadn't even bothered to turn away from his book, Harry noted lazily. “Think I’ll take a nap. Join me?”

When Harry pulled his Dark Lord on top of him, this time on the bigger chaise, their fingers came laced.

**Author's Note:**

> Small hands are cute. Awakening monsterfucker Harry is also cute.
> 
> Fortunately, these two things are not mutually exclusive.


End file.
